Let's Talk Romance: Romance vs. romance

I'd like to talk about the "R/r" in romance - what it means when I use the capital "R" versus the lowercase "r". I know this might seem obvious to some of you, but it's an important point, because there is a big difference between, say, a Romantic hero and a romantic hero, and lines get blurred when I argue that the romantic hero IS the Romantic hero, as I am wont to do.

When I write the words romance or romantic with a lowercase "r", I am referring to romance as we define the term today, and when I refer to a "romance" or a "romantic" hero, I am referring to the hero of a romance fiction novel (for example, Wrath in Dark Lover), or, if I'm not pointing to a specific romance fiction text, to a character that embodies these "romance hero" characteristics. When I write "Romance" or "Romantic", I'm making a reference to the literature of the Romantic Period (approx. 1789-1837, though these numbers seem to shift depending on who one talks to). The Romance or Romantic hero is a character who embodies certain Romantic characteristics (for example, Manfred in Byron's Manfred is a Romantic hero). I will often refer to the Byronic hero as a Romantic hero, but technically he could be seen as a subcategory of the general Romantic hero type.

My academic argument (or rather, the argument I hope someday to make, in an Honour's or a Master's or a Ph.D thesis) is that not all Romantic heroes are romance heroes but all romance heroes are Romantic heroes. I realize that the "all" is problematic -- there are a lot of heroes in romance fiction today that do not have Romantic characteristics. However, the basic formula is a good point of departure.

Let's Talk Romance: the Byronic Hero

I just passed in a creative project in Victorian Literature in which I first defined the Romantic hero and then searched for him in the novels of the Victorian Period. I thought I'd share some interesting tidbits:

Here's what Northrop Frye (an important Canadian theorist) has to say about the Romantic (and more specifically, the Byronic) hero:

“The so-called Byronic hero is often a Romantic version of the natural man, who, like Esau or Ishmael, is an outcast, a solitary much given to communing with untamed nature, and who thus represents the potentially expanding and liberating elements in that nature. He has great energy, often great powers of leadership, and even his vices are dignified enough to have some aesthetic attraction. He is often aristocratic in birth or behaviour, with a sense that, like Esau, he is the dispossessed rightful heir – here the theme combines with the sense of nostalgia for a vanished aristocracy. When he is evil, there is often the feeling that, as with Byron's Cain, his evil is comprehensible, that he is not wholly evil any more than society is wholly good, and that even his evil is a force that society has to reckon with” (30-31).

“[T]he “Byronic” hero...is placed outside the structure of civilization and therefore represents the force of physical nature, amoral or ruthless, yet with a sense of power, and often of leadership, that society has impoverished itself by rejecting” (41).

Mmm...doesn't that sound like every juicy male hero in romance fiction that you've ever lusted after? Here's another, similar description:

“...A man greater than others in emotion, capability, and suffering. Only among wild and vast forms of nature – the ocean, the precipices and glaciers of the Alps – can he find a counterpart to his own titanic passions. Driven by a demon within, he is fatal to himself and others; for no one can resist his hypnotic fascination and authority. He has committed a sin that itself expressions his superiority: lesser men could not even conceive a like transgression” (Perkins 782)

It makes me a little dreamy just to write out these descriptions – the Byronic hero IS the modern romance hero! It's simply amazing that these parallels are so obvious and yet no one's really talking about them.

I have a ton more ideas I'd love to write out, including my thoughts the fascinating concept of "Romantic agony" that Frye discusses briefly, but I've learned from reading other people's blogs that if it's too long, it doesn't get read, so I'll parcel out my exciting tidbits a little at a time.

Works Cited

Frye, Northrop. A Study of English Romanticism. New York:      Random House, 1968.
Perkins, David, ed. “George Gordon, Lord Byron:      Introduction.” English Romantic Writers. San Diego: HBJ,      1967. 779-787.

Book Review: Naked in Death

I guess it will be up to me to write reviews about JD Robb/Nora Roberts since Falina does not read her books. I will use this first book in the series to represent all of them (around 20, I believe). These books are wonderful, and span at least three genres. There is romance, science fiction, and even the hard-core mystery readers will not be disappointed. One of the wonderful things about Nora Roberts is she never writes a scene that is unbelievable, and though these books are set around 2059, the only thing that really differs are the way crimes are committed and the technology advancement. What really makes the jump of 50 years barely noticeable is the depiction of society as gritty, corrupt, but oh-so-honest. People as a whole don't change (but an individual can), and that is the theme at the core of these books.

As for the characters - Eve Dallas is a hard-ass cop, but she's lovable and human in her own ways. She sees the world in black and white, with no room for shades of grey. She stands for the good and the moral. She's a orphan with a dark history, and her job is the only thing she lives for. Throughout the novels you see how actually having someone in her life changes her (for the better).

Roarke (just Roarke) is the richest, most successful businessman on and off planet, and he earned his first fortune in smuggling. He is a former bad-boy who cleans up into having a civilized veneer with a hard edge beneath. He is described as being beautiful, with a face a poet could only dream of, and a black Irish heritage. He has a sexy accent and the body of a god - which is perfectly toned through exercise instead of the popular body sculpting techniques. He loves to read physical books in an age where everything is electronic, and is a big fan of Yeats (or one of those poets). In short, he's ever girl's ideal man.

The only unfortunate thing is that after book 4(?) the main couple is married. There is relatively no UST, and though they still have hot sex, there is only so long I can remain interested in the same people having sex in the same ways. The good news is that they aren't without their problems, what with Eve and her moral fiber and Roarke and his lack thereof. Both of them also have immensely dark pasts, which only adds to their relationship.

Joint Review: Lover Eternal and Lover Awakened

I read these back to back last Friday, from 4 PM to 3 AM, because I really wanted to read Lover Awakened, but Lover Eternal was the second book published, so I felt I had to read that one first. As such, the books are unavoidably linked in my mind and so will be reviewed together.

Everything that Dark Lover had these books have, though in slightly lesser degrees -- despite my expectations, I prefer Dark Lover and Wrath to these these novels, on Rhage and Zsadist, respectively. They were still erotic, angst-filled, and wonderful, though. As could be expected, Lover Awakened is the more angsty of the two. I loved it, but I have an issue with the development of Zsadist that echoes a sentiment I felt after reading and watching Hannibal Rising earlier this year -- I resent the need to justify a "bad" character. The enigma of Hannibal Lecter becomes a revenge story. Zsadist becomes a good, sweet guy trapped by evil circumstances, that just needs a little love to let his "good" side show again. I don't want his good side, though -- I want bad for bad's sake. I don't mind an incomprehensible bad, an unsympathetic bad. I don't need a compelling reason or a justification for badness, and I don't think you do either, reader. Just once I would like a hero that is just unashamedly, inexplicably bad, without some tragic back story.

The next Lover book is about Butch, who is a human, but I still think it might be good. With every novel J.R. Ward is opening up new possibilities for future novels, and I hope she goes on forever. I'm really looking forward to the novel on Vishous, now.

Review: Fantasy Lover

I can't remember when I read this -- sometime last week, certainly. I didn't take any notes and I don't have all that much to say about it as a result. I had heard that this book isn't as good as her later ones, and I'm willing to believe that. It's not that it wasn't enjoyable, but it's been pretty much overshadowed by its proximity to Bitten and Dark Lover and even Flowers from the Storm. I would say it was only okay, for a few reasons which may be completely personal. First of all, the hero is a demi-god and I found the author's portrayal of Aphrodite, Athena, and Eros both corny and uncharacteristic. The heroine was boring (and plain!) and the hero wasn't nearly dark enough for a Spartan warrior who was trapped into being a love slave for two thousand years. The book also contains one of the cheesiest sentences I've ever read; the heroine's name is Grace and the phrase is "You're my saving Grace." It hurt just to rewrite it. If this book is a must-read to understand the other books in the series, I'm fine with that. I'm willing to try a few of the others, but if they're as sappy and cheesy and un-angsty as this one, I'm going to give up quickly.

Let's Talk Romance: A Poem

Romance
By Andrew Lang

My lover dwelt in a Northern land.
A grey tower in a forest green
Was hers, and far on either hand
The long wash of the waves was seen,
And leagues on leagues of yellow sand,
The woven forest boughs between.

And through the silver Northern light
The sunset slowly died away,
And herds of strange deer, lily-white,
Stole forth among the branches grey;
About the coming of the light,
They fled like ghosts before the day.

I know not if the forest green
Still girdles round that castle grey;
I know not if the boughs between
The white deer vanish ere the day;
Above my love the grass is green,
My heart is colder than the clay.

I'm not sure I would use this as a representative of romance (as Henry A. Beers seems to have done by including before the preface to his A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century), but there is a lot in it that I would consider romantic (and Romantic) and it reminds me of a lot of things I have read -- The Lord of the Rings, Rebecca, The Last Unicorn, some of L.J. Smith's books from the Night World series...I could probably go on. Doesn't it have that lonely haunting quality that works so well for romance?

Review: Dark Lover

I just read Dark Lover straight through, and what can I say? Most of what I'm feeling for this book is just a warm, unarticulated feeling of glee. I loved it. I love the idea of Wrath, The Blind King of the vampires. He was as hot as hell -- this book gets 5/5 for eroticism, definitely. However, the other five members of the Black Dagger Brotherhood were all also attractive to varying degrees, and this book was somewhat overshadowed by the fact that as soon as I read about Zsadist I wanted to read the novel devoted to him (though I hate the reappropriation of words and names by adding pointless letters - Wrath is the only one that has a correctly spelled word for a name. The rest are Rhage, Tohrment, Zsadist, etc.). Something that really sets this book apart is the language -- the male characters talk like rappers, which I would have expected to annoy me, but it turned out to be refreshing and enhanced the appeal and charm of the characters.

Review: Flowers from the Storm

I'm on fire with the romances -- I just finished Flowers from the Storm, which was rated #2 of "Reader's 25 Favourite Books" in the December issue of Romantic Times Book Reviews.

In my mind, it is nowhere near the caliber of Bitten, but it's almost impossible to rate different sub-genres on the same quality scale, anyway. This one is what it is -- a historical romance from the early nineties, the kind that you find in hardcover at your local library with thick, slightly yellowed pages and Fabio on the cover. In other words, the kind of romance I love. This one has an interesting plot point, which is the reason I chose it; the hero, the Duke of Jervaulx, is a handsome rake that has a stroke which, among other more minor things, renders him unable to speak or understand speech. This only enhances the romantic heroism of him -- he doesn't talk much, when he does it's terse, and he is brooding, angry, and violent. Mmm.

The heroine, a Quaker who knew him slightly before the stroke and met him again afterward, is all right, but nothing really special, and all her "thy"s and "thou"s are irritating if historically accurate and/or religiously appropriate.

The sex is really surprisingly good -- I give it a 4/5 on the erotic scale. I would complain that the book wasn't dark enough, but like a drug addict that has to have more and more to feel the same high, I am beginning to find that I crave more angst and darkness with every book I read.

Review: Bitten

I stayed up until 5:30 AM this morning, reading Bitten straight through. I can't remember the last time I felt compelled to do that. The first thing I thought as I finally put it down was wow, that was great. It energized me and now I feel back in the game, waiting for a ride to the library to pick up another romance (though Bitten is actually sold as horror at our local Indigo -- nonsense). I also bought two more books, Fantasy Lover by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dark Lover by J.R. Ward, with the guidance of Indigo's resident romance expert.

Bitten is a werewolf romance, but it feels very fresh and different (perhaps that is why it is not classified as romance). The best thing I can say about it is that though it fits a mold it is not formulaic -- the human love interest isn't a jerk and the bad-boy werewolf isn't a brooding enigma, but isn't sentimental and corny, either. Elena is an assertive, take-charge heroine, but again, she manages to escape the "spunky gal that intrigues hero" formula. And though Clay is certainly magnetic, there are other main characters with an equal amount of charisma -- Jeremy, for example. There's plenty to be interested in, in other words.

Wow, Clay sure is hot, though. I love the southern accent. I love his unrepentant badness. I very rarely read serial books featuring the same character (after they've said their "I love you"s, I turn away and don't look back) but I'm considering Stolen.

Other random points:

- Usually I hate it when the heroine is torn between two men -- it makes me anxious. I like a clear winner. It didn't bother me in this one though -- there's never really much doubt which one has her heart.

- Usually, I like sex to be held off until at least the middle and admission of love to wait until the very end -- however, it isn't like that in this book, and it works just fine the way it is.

- I spent half the book rooting for another hero but wasn't disappointed with the outcome.

Let's Talk Romance: Blogs

I've been searching on and off for a while...and now I've found a couple of solid looking blogs that discuss romance fiction from an analytic/academic point of view:

http://teachmetonight.blogspot.com
http://www.romancingtheblog.com/blog/

Also (and I got this directly from the first blog) a documentary called "Who's Afraid of Happy Endings?" discussing romance fiction is going to be playing on BRAVO! in Canada on Thursday, March 8th, at 8:30 PM EST. As someone who has been searching for a long time (albeit half-assedly) for any information on romance fiction on the internet, I assure you that this is big and wonderful and exciting and has already proven worth the effort (that documentary is a great find! I suggest that everybody watch it!)